[ The following essay contains SPOILERS; YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED! ] Of manga  author Junji Ito’s innumerable masterpieces (including such long-running series as Tomie  and Uzumaki  and self-contained one-shots like The Enigma of Amigara Fault  and The Hell of the Doll Funeral ), Town of No Roads  is probably his most flawed. Its sprawling, expansive themes strain against a narrative too narrow and restrictive to properly contain them, the central allegory and its orbiting metaph

[ The following essay contains MAJOR SPOILERS; YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED! ] At first glance, the premise of Junji Ito’s “Smashed” is almost...

[The following review contains SPOILERS; YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!] Junji Ito’s “Hanging Blimp” features a brilliant moment of dark comedy....

[The following essay contains SPOILERS; YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!] Junji Ito’s Uzumaki begins unassumingly enough. The protagonist, Kirie...

[The following essay contains MAJOR SPOILERS; YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!] The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of...

[The following essay contains SPOILERS; YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!] When questioned about the underlying themes of Gyo, author Junji Ito...

[WARNING: The following essay contains MAJOR SPOILERS!] I spent hours searching for the right adjective to describe the unique flavor of...